The appeal of personal space and home-cooked meals outweighs the couple-mile trek to campus for elementary education junior Devon Dowling.

Dowling said her four-bedroom Capstone Commons apartment in the Northern Tier was the best choice for her desire to leave campus.

"I showed my parents that it was actually cheaper to live here," she said, while waiting for a bus near her apartment. "We only pay for utilities, and look at how nice everything is."

Northern Tier apartment complexes offer bus passes to residents, saving them the time and money of writing a $45 check to the Capital Area Transportation Authority.

Like Capstone Commons, complexes in Bath Township - Melrose Apartments, the Village at Chandler Crossings and Crossing Place Apartments - also pull people away from campus with extra amenities.

Telecommunication sophomore Phil Detolve said Melrose Apartments' large bedrooms with private bathrooms, in-house washer and dryer, 24-hour weight room, pool and basketball and volleyball courts drew him to the complex.

The distance from campus can be an inconvenience, but buses run regularly and it's a straight shot down to East Lansing, Detolve said.

"It can be annoying," he said. "The buses come every 15 minutes, so you have to plan accordingly, but in the evening parking is free, so it balances out."

Many complexes in the Northern Tier offer one parking space per bedroom rented.

One of Detolve's roommates, finance sophomore Scott Vandekerkhoff, said the distance doesn't bother him because many of his friends live in the surrounding Northern Tier complexes. He said his favorite aspect of his Melrose apartment is the basic cable television and Internet access included in their rent.

"You just plug in and you're good to go," he said. "There is a band-width limitation, but that's good because it keeps the network going. We don't need to run a server or download lots of movies."

But as more students head north, and out of East Lansing, neighboring Bath Township is beginning to feel the impact.

Township Superintendent Mark Ritter said student apartments have increased the township's tax base, creating additional revenue. But that money gets used up by the additional demand on emergency and other services.

In fact, the township needed to add an additional full-time police officer to their current 10-officer staff. Ritter said the force also has around three part-time officers and three reserves.

The additional labor and equipment cost the township about $60,000, he said.

But while growth in Bath Township has cost the community some cash, Ritter said construction in the area has improved relations between the township and East Lansing. The two communities are teaming together to solve traffic issues near Chandler Road. It's a relationship East Lansing and Bath Township haven't always had.

"There were some bad feelings in the past, but as we've talked with them we've decided to put things behind us and move forward with a good working relationship," he said.

Students, for the most part, keep quiet and spend most of their free time in East Lansing, Ritter said.

"The students don't interact with most of Bath - it's a place to reside, then they head to campus," he said.

"Bath is, by and large, a family community and there is little industry and not a lot of business - nothing that would direct them northerly.

"They do their business south."